built up a network of about 400 correspondents in all countries through whom it receives information about the immigration possibilities. The material is collected in Germany, both according to countries and vocation. We can state with a certain satisfaction that we have in this work on the whole avoided mistakes in regard to directing emigration. This was possible only because after careful investigation we rejected all fantastic projects, even if it meant running the risk of seeming to be too reticent and too cautious. We had in many cases to act not as an advisory office, but as a dissuading office.
“We have for the time being had to restrict ourselves to promoting only single emigrants, single families, or small groups of families, in order to make it possible for them, when they have succeded in their new homes, to bring over their relatives and friends. We hope that in this way we have assisted many to gradually find new places which will be a new home to them.
“There are also a number of plans under consideration which will go beyond the promotion of this small emigration to the settlement of a larger number of fami###s in closed settlements, but it would be premature now to speak of this work which is still in preparation.”
Herr Warburg concluded with a restatement of the policies and functions of the Hilfs#erein.
“The Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden does not influence anyone to emigrate, nor does it attempt to persuade co-religionists to remain in Germany,” he declared. “The future of the individual Jew in Germany cannot be decided by the Hilfsverein. The conditions differ in each case. The Hilfsverein can only offer its counsel to the would be emigrant. It can help by preventing those who are determined to change their course of life from taking the wrong road.
“The fate that has come upon the German Jews has, as always when sorrow has broken upon a community, also resulted in self-retlization. It has made people think. In this time of suffering, the German Jews are finding a great deal of help from their co-religionists abroad, and we want to express from this place our sincere gratitude for this help. It is a work of co-operation in the charitable field, but only for charitable purposes, as I must emphasize for specific reasons in order to repudiate the allegations which are constantly being made that there is a political world Jewry, with Jewish economic, financial and political international combination.
“We have also to thank all those non-Jews abroad who have self-sacrificingly come to the assistance of German Jewish emigrants. In this way large numbers of Jewish scholars have been provided with new fields of activity in many new countries. We are now in the midst of a difficult work, and we ask you all to continue to help us in the realization that such help carries its own reward, as Rabbi Joshua said: ‘More than he who gives to the poor, does for the poor, the poor does for the giver.’ “
A second news letter on the work of the Hilfsverein will appear in tomorrow’s issue.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
